Their skin was slick. Cassie put her legs around Ares, heels digging into his buttocks, to try and alleviate the tension. He palmed her breast, trapping a nipple between his fingers, pinching.
‘Your mouth…’ Cassie whispered hoarsely, half deranged with the fire inside her. ‘Put your mouth on me.’
Ares obliged, surrounding that taut peak in heat, teeth nipping at her tender flesh and it was that that finally pushed Cassie over the edge and soaring free, higher than she’d ever flown before. Her body wasn’t hers any more, it was in the grip of something primal and timeless as she contracted around Ares’s body.
Her orgasm was the end of him. He pulled back, trying to hold on, every muscle and sinew taut, but he couldn’t do it, he fell too, joining Cassie in her sea of oblivion, bodies welded together, breathing hard. Hearts pounding for long minutes until, finally, the last pulses of pleasure ebbed away and left them at peace.
Ares’s return to consciousness was slow. He felt as though he were climbing through a million layers, and then he had the gut-emptying sensation that he’d never find his way out to daylight again. He was aware he was half asleep and starting to panic. An all too familiar sensation. Claustrophobia closing in around him, suffocating him.
He came to with a start, sitting up in a bed, breathing hard, sweating. In an enclosed space. Very dim light coming through the only window. It took him long agonising seconds to place himself. He was in the cabin. On a boat.Not that boat.A sliver of relief went through him but not enough.
He looked beside him to see Cassie in a sprawl. Lying on her front, arms out beside her head. Long back. Hair wild, spread out over the pillow. Sheet covering her bottom. Not even that provocative sight could jolt Ares out of the increasing sense of claustrophobia. It was testament to how much he’d wanted her that he’d been distracted enough to make love to her down here at all.
He needed air. Heart pounding, skin clammy, fighting the waves of panic threatening to pull him down into a nightmare, Ares left the cabin.
Chapter Eight
CASSIE WASN’T SUREwhat had woken her but she knew before she opened her eyes that she was alone in the bed that took up much of the cabin. She also noticed that the boat was still, only rocking gently. The storm had passed. In more ways than one.
She turned over and cracked open her eyes to see pale daylight. Sheets in a tangle. She smelledthemin the air, sex. It made her insides clench as she tried to wrap her brain around what had happened.
She was no longer a virgin. She’d never expected sex to be so…all-encompassing. Transcendent.Amazing.
She ached all over but pleasurably. Between her legs felt tender and her face got hot as she remembered how frustrated she’d been with Ares’s teasing. And then, the exquisite pleasure/pain of him entering her body.
Where was he?There was no sound from outside the cabin. Gingerly, Cassie got up and cracked open the door. The main cabin was empty. The door leading up to the deck was open though.
She caught a glimpse of herself in the mirror in the en suite and groaned. Smeared make-up, glitter on her cheeks. She washed her face quickly and saw Ares’s T-shirt on the ground and reached for it, pulling it on. It reached to mid-thigh. She went up the small set of steps and emerged into a cloudless dawn morning. The storm well and truly gone.
Ares was at the stern of the boat, his back to her. Jeans riding low on his hips. He didn’t seem to hear her. She went out, feeling suddenly shy after last night. She stopped a couple of feet behind him, near the control panel and wheel. She cleared her throat and saw him flinch.What?
Confused now, Cassie went and stood alongside Ares and looked at him. His hair was wild but his face arrested her. It was pale, almost green. Her initial thought was that he was seasick. It wasn’t unheard of even after a few days at sea. And it had been stormy. ‘Ares…are you OK? Are you ill?’
He looked at her and his eyes were wild. She noticed that he wasn’t really looking at her. More like through her. He wasn’t seasick. It was something else. A sliver of fear went through Cassie.
She touched Ares’s arm and then down until she could take his hand. She tugged him over to the seat on one side of the deck. ‘Sit down, Ares.’
He did. As obedient as a little boy. She came down on her haunches in front of him. ‘Ares? What’s going on?’
His glazed expression didn’t change. He shook his head. ‘I can’t…’
Cassie thought of something and said, ‘Wait here.’ Even though he didn’t look capable of going anywhere. She went back down into the cabin and hunted around until she found what she was looking for.
She went back up on deck and handed Ares a tumbler glass with a measure of whiskey. ‘Drink this.’
He took it but she noticed his hand wasn’t steady so she put her hand around his and lifted it to his mouth. He swallowed a drop. Cassie said, ‘More.’
He looked at her and for the first time she noticed he saw her and felt heartened. He took some more. Cassie noticed his hand wasn’t trembling any more. She came up on the seat beside him.
The sun was coming up, bathing the wide sky in shades of pink. After a few moments, Cassie said as lightly as she could, ‘Was it that traumatic?’
Ares looked at her, uncomprehending, and then he got it. She was talking about him taking her virginity. He shook his head and the ghost of a smile touched his mouth. ‘No, it’s nothing to do with you.’
But had it been as amazing for him as it had been for her? She doubted that.
‘Then…what was that?’
He looked at her and threw back the last of the whiskey. She took the empty glass and put it down. She thought he wasn’t going to say anything and then eventually he said, ‘I was kidnapped, when I was ten. They held me on a boat. Locked in a cabin for two weeks.’
